was too exact and punctual a man to succeed well in eccentricity; and for the most part the least amusing passages of the Doctor are those which are most determinedly jocular. But there is a quiet, latent playfulness in the more orderly parts, which fits in well with the graver matter. Nothing can be more charming than the domestic incidents and scenes; and the book is rife with that wise insight into English life which we have already mentioned as one of the choice fruits of our author's years spent in gathering true and Divine wisdom, and in carefully practising what he enforced on others.

Such was Southey, according to our, perhaps not always accurate or thoroughly-informed, impressions of him. But if we have gone wrong on any point, we are sure that it must be one on which his memory would not suffer, by our being set right; and, "take him all in all," we fear that it may be long "before we look upon his like again."

On the important Discrepancy between the Church of England and the Scottish Episcopal Community, showing the Schismatical Character of a Subscription by English Clerics to the Scottish Communion Office of 1765. By the Rev. EDWARD CRAIG, formerly Pastor of St. James' Chapel, Edinburgh.

THE title of this pamphlet, coupled with the name of its author, may fill, with some surprise, any one who has been acquainted with Edinburgh during the last fifteen years. After his long retirement from the scene of his former ministry, we were not prepared to find Mr. Craig once more challenging public attention, by presenting himself on the arena of controversy. And we were still less prepared for the subject which he has chosen, and for the circumstances under which he has thought proper to bring that subject forward.

It is strange that, with the strong sense which Mr. Craig professes to entertain of the popish or idolatrous nature of the Scottish communion office, he should, for so many years, have endured the pollution of ministering as one of the presbyters of that corrupt church. And it is no less strange, that he should have reserved this censure, until the moment arrived which seemed favourable for exciting, or, at least, fomenting dissensions in that congregation, among whom he formerly ministered.

Mr. Craig has bestowed some pains, in order to prove that a presbyter of the Church of England cannot, consistently with his obligations as such, conform to the office of the holy communion used in the Church of Scotland. And he grounds his argument on the alleged discrepancy between the two; as he accuses the Scottish Church of holding both the sacrifice of the mass, and transubstantiation. For to this, in fact, do his charges amount. As to what regards the merits of this communion office, however, it is only necessary to examine it without prejudice, and to compare it with that of the Church of England, in order to admit that there is no essential discrepancy between them. The same great truths which are fully implied in the office of our communion, and which have been invariably held by the soundest and best divines of our Church, are, indeed, more prominently brought forward in the office of the Scottish Church; but there is no essential difference between them.

The peculiar circumstances in which Mr. Craig was placed, render his present charges against the Scottish Episcopal Church, not only peculiarly ungraceful, but altogether incompatible with consistency of opinion, or even of character, on his part. And we will dwell the rather on this subject, because the arguments which we would direct against Mr. Craig apply with still greater force to Mr. Drummond. Both the one and the other of them accuse the Scottish Church of having changed her character, and of adopting terms of communion which are incompatible with the ordination vows of a clergyman of the Church of England. And we will admit that, in the year 1838, certain changes were effected in the Scottish Church; but, when we inquire what these changes were, we shall find, not only that they are perfectly compatible with the allegiance due to the church of England by her own presbyters, but, that they have produced no essential alteration in the Church of Scotland.

The changes which were effected by the 28th canon of the Scottish church, in the year 1838, were first, an enactment which required that the ritual, and no extemporaneous prayer, should be used at every public ministration: and secondly, an enactment that the Scottish communion office should be used at all the General Synodal meetings of the Scottish Church, it having been previously used by obligation only at the consecration of bishops.

With regard to these changes, it must be generally admitted, that every church, or body of any sort, has a right to effect alterations in itself. The first of these was nothing more than to place the law on the same footing as that which exists in the Church of England. But Mr. Drummond has endeavoured to give to this regulation the colour of persecution, as if it had been directed expressly against him. Now, whether or not its enactment may have been caused by his irregularities has nothing to do with the rights or merits of the case. It may be, that, with his single exception, all the clergy in the Scottish Church had hitherto preferred the use of the Prayer-Book, on public occasions, to their own extemporaneous prayers; and that his singularity first showed the necessity of thus guarding the services of the Church against such innovations. But this, even if it were so, is no persecution.

The second of these regulations was nothing more than a very trifling alteration. The peculiar office for the holy communion, which is regularly and constantly used in several Scottish congregations, and is used at Episcopal consecrations, was henceforward to be used at meetings of general Synods. Surely this was a change which could not, in any way, affect the character of the services of the Church, or of the Church herself. If the Scottish communion office was so nearly Romish as to render its use incompatible with allegiance to the Church of England, it was so half a century ago as much as now. And yet, in the face of this, the English congregations in Scotland, were then set under Scottish bishops; and in the face of this did Messieurs Craig and Drummond, many years ago, join themselves to that communion, whose corruptions they now, with such feeling indignation, denounce.

When, in the reign of King Charles I., a Prayer-Book was prepared for Scotland, the communion office of the first Prayer-Book of King Edward VI. was adopted instead of that of the ritual then in use in England. But, as it was found that, at that time, the popular prejudice in Scotland against the use of any preconceived service whatever, was so violent as to present an insurmountable impediment, it was not then practically introduced. And, from the reign of King Charles I. to the revolution, when, with the exception of the period of republican usurpation, Episcopacy predominated in Scotland, there was no Service-Book in general use.

When the Presbyterian sect was established in connexion with the State at the revolution, the Church became a despised, persecuted, and, of course, greatly diminished body. All the Presbyterian elements were drained off, and nothing remained that was not thoroughly Episcopalian. The Prayer-Book was then generally introduced: and, after a time, it was deemed expedient to re-model the communion office, with a view to render it, as was conceived, more in accordance with primitive institution. This was effected in or about the year 1760, when the present office was framed, and it obtained, generally, in the northern congregations, and was, in fact, the acknowledged office of the Church, being always used in episcopal consecrations. It is now no more than it has always been, and it has always been as much as it is now, the communion office of the Scottish Church. And no alteration effected in 1838, by the introduction of the 28th canon, can afford any ground for the assertion that the constitution of the Church is changed.

Thus, if Mr. Craig had acted consistently with the views he now sets forth, he never would have conformed to the Scottish Church, or ministered as one of her presbyters. But, it would appear that he has reserved his censures, until he found an opportunity of directing them against the harmony of that congregation where he formerly officiated. The evil effect of schism engendering itself, and spreading its malignant infection, soon became manifest in the Scottish Church. The discovery which, during the course of these proceedings, Mr. Drummond thought that he had made of popery in the Scottish communion office, and at which he eagerly grasped, as a handle of excuse for his conduct, soon became the alleged reason of a bold attempt at a similar result on the part of a portion of the congregation of another chapel, in communion with the Scottish Church-that chapel where Mr. Craig, for so many years, exercised his ministry. They endeavoured to induce his successor, the Rev. D. Bagot, to imitate Mr. Drummond's example, and throw off the communion of the Scottish Church, renouncing submission to her bishops. This attempt, urged and abetted as it was, in the most unprincipled manner, by Mr. Craig, of which the pamphlet at the head of this article is a proof, was steadily resisted by Mr. Bagot, whose conduct, under very trying circumstances, exhibited the triumph of sound church principles. When he was found to be staunch to his duty to his diocesan, an attempt was next made to oust him from the ministry of the chapel, by a portion of the congregation who were inclined to schism, and who made a strenuous effort to withdraw the chapel from its connexion with the Scottish Church, and to transform themselves into a body of Independents, like the hearers of Mr. Drummond.

It may, indeed, be said, that the existence of so loose and illregulated a body, as the congregation in question, within the pale of the Church, is an eyesore and blemish, and that their departure is rather to be desired than to be deprecated. Yet it is mournful that so many persons should, for a series of years, have assumed the name of Churchmen, and should have constantly used our prayers, and worshipped according to our ritual, and yet, after all, should have received so little benefit from their privileges.

It is because this unhappy schism, which has lately arisen in the Church of Scotland, has, in some measure, implicated that of England, and has even compromised our ecclesiastical character, that it seems incumbent upon us, in justice to ourselves, still more than to the Scottish Church, to call for the vindication of the violated principle of churchmanship; for, we must remember that he who has become a schismatic in Scotland is a presbyter of the Church of England. And when, after committing a great sin in his relations with the Scottish Church, and virtually excommunicating himself from her, he proposes to fall back upon us, we are bound to withhold from him the sanction which might support him in his course of error, and, for our own sakes, to repudiate the claim which he wishes to establish to our countenance and support.

The facts of this painful case are already pretty generally known to the public, and as they have been detailed at some length, in one of our former numbers, we will not here venture, even shortly, to recapitulate them; more especially as the view of the subject which we consider as infinitely the most important has, as yet, scarcely been touched upon. This is the manner in which the schism of Mr. Drummond from the Scottish Church affects that of England, of which he is a presbyter. It is to this particular view of the case that we purpose now to direct our attention.

Referring, for the facts of the case, to our former number, to which we have already alluded, and recommending to our readers to peruse

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the correspondence between Bishop Terrot and Mr. Drummond, which, as it has been published in the cheapest form, is easily accessible to all, we will merely say that the Bishop's conduct has been distinguished by mildness and forbearance, while that of Mr. Drummond exhibits some most painful characteristics an undutiful and quibbling attempt to embarrass the bishop by questions, and thereby to lead him to commit himself, and an assumption to himself of high gifts of edification, and of superior spiritual discernment, extolling the beneficial effects of his own extemporaneous prayer, and asserting that the substitution of the Church's prayers in their place would be hurtful to the best interests of his people. In short, the result of the controversy was such as might have been expected, where the parties were a firm and mild bishop, and a heady and latitudinarian presbyter, in a church where spiritual authority is supported neither by temporal dignity, nor by state protection. Mr. Drummond rebelled against the bishop, and set him at defiance.

The advantage of discipline is, that, in a difficult question, the superior authority shall direct the subordinate; and the merit of obedience is, that the subordinate shall bow of doubt and uncertainty. If we only obey where, even according to the superior in a matter to our own views, our duty is clear, what thank have we? When he who was set over Mr. Drummond in the Lord, expressed his judgment, that judgment ought to have met with unconditional obedience, as long as it did not involve anything subversive of Scripture, or of the authority of the Church; more especially as the point was not one which could have affected any unbiassed or healthy conscience. The substitution of the public prayers for his own extemporaneous addresses could not possibly, in reason, have appeared to him the substitution of the worse instead of the better, or an abridgment of christian liberty. And even if he had regarded it in that light, he should have submitted to him that was over him in the Lord for conscience' sake.

But, supposing that he could not conscientiously do this, he might at least have qualified his disobedience by quitting the Bishop of Edinburgh's jurisdiction, going to minister in that Church in which he was originally ordained, or else remaining where he was, silent and inactive, but at least not disobedient.

This, however, was not the course which he pursued. On the contrary, he consummated his disobedience by incurring the guilt of schism, accepting the invitation of a number of his congregation, who separated themselves from the communion of the Scottish Church, and formed themselves into a conventicle of Independents. Mr. Drummond thus became, in the first instance, a schismatic; committing an act of rebellion against him that was lawfully set over him, and encouraging a number of those to whom he had formerly ministered, in their separation from the branch of the Christian Church to which they had belonged: thus tearing asunder the body of Christ. And, in the second place, Mr. Drummond him